Laser tissue welding (LTW) is a promising alternative to wound repair using conventional techniques such as sutures, staples and clips.
Small amounts of injury to delicate structures, such as those inflicted in microsurgery, can cause wound closure to fail. Practitioners with the surgical skills at a level necessary to perform these types of repairs are limited.
Suturing is slow and difficult to perform through an endoscope. The limits to stapler miniaturization reduce the scope of endoscopic surgery, whereas its introduction can convert many open surgeries to an endoscopic approach. Further, suture repairs are usually not completely watertight. Leakage can occur in the gaps between sutures and needle holes.
LTW has recently received much attention because of its potential advantages, applicable in all branches of surgery: rapid wound healing, reduced surgical time, less foreign body reactions, little or no fibrosis, no chance of stricture or stenosis development, immediate intraoperative watertight sealing and non-lithogenicity over conventional wound closure methods. Wounds treated by LTW have minimal inflammatory response, near-normal collagen content, minimal residue breaks and disorientation in the collagen and elastin fibers.
LTW can be used in, but not limited to, microsurgery, watertight sealing, endoscopic surgery and cosmetic surgery.
LTW reduces these technician demands and deficiencies in the conventional techniques.